Fish Fry
by The Cosmic Penguin
Summary: The 'Return' quartet is about to finish the game, but yet another distraction in the form of Kirby's Ultra Sword has been thrown in their way. Written for the Ultra Tuna! Though I doubt he'd appreciate it.


_Edit: This thing is riddled with flaws, but it's not great enough to warrant actual fixing, so I'll just patch up the most glaring examples. It's saved from deletion solely because of the stats, otherwise this thing would've been gone. I have better food-related oneshots than this..._

* * *

"I got it!"

"No, _I've_ got it!" Kirby shouted as he leapt up toward the enemies and morphed his weapon into a huge, deadly weapon of extreme mass and power. The common enemies fled at the impending doom, but were caught in Kirby's time-freezing powers and smacked with whatever form of the Ultra Sword Kirby happened to pull out—in this case, the Ultra Tuna. The stars along its scales flashed rainbow colors as it splashed salt water all over the sides of the volcanoes and felled its foes. The Ultra Tuna morphed back into the Ultra Sword as Kirby landed and struck a pose.

Then he realized that his friends were staring at him, so he turned toward them.

"Was that…" Dedede's eye twitched. Bandana Dee seemed frozen. Meta Knight…well, you could never be too sure what Meta Knight was thinking because he was usually wearing his mask, but since he wasn't saying anything, he was either in shock or snickering quietly.

"Was that a _FISH?!"_ Dedede finally shouted.

Kirby raised a technically nonexistent eyebrow. "Uhhh…yeah. It was. What's it to you? It beat the enemies and it looked cool—or, at least funny."

"Could you do that again?" Bandana Dee asked.

"Hmmm…" Kirby stopped and tapped the star on his hat with the tip of his sword. "Well, maybe. I didn't expect that to pop up. It's the one I have the least amount of knowledge to grasp on. Not to mention that it's even heavier than the weapons. Why do you ask? Or do I want to know?"

"Well, I was just wondering...is it possible to _eat_ it?" Bandana Dee asked dreamily. "My tribe used to live along the ocean, so it was the first thing that came to mind; good old spear-fishing."

Kirby looked confused for a moment. Then his eyes lit up and he assumed a 'thinking' pose. "You know, I never thought about that. It doesn't seem to be alive when I use it, so maybe…"

The same idea entered everyone's mind—fish dinner for free. Heck, they were even in a lava pit, so cooking the thing wouldn't be too hard to do. There were no dishes to do either; they could cook it their own way. All four members of the quartet licked their lips (it was kind of hard to tell with Bandana Dee and Meta Knight, though). The three sidekicks turned to Kirby, who glanced at his sword. "Does this mean I'll be giving up my ability if I keep the fish and eat it?"

"Who cares?!" Dedede roared. "We're hungry here and so are you!"

"Hm." Kirby paused. "Good point."

* * *

"This is hopeless; that fish isn't gonna come up again."

"Meta Knight, stop being such a pessimist. We've only been here for about five minutes," Bandana Dee snapped.

"Five minutes, yeah. That's not a long time at all when he makes fifty swings a minute." Meta Knight rolled his eyes. "This was the first time we've seen it throughout the entire adventure! It might be a _while_ before we see it agai—"

The puffball yelled at Kirby as high-salt-content water splashed through his visor and into his eyes; Bandana Dee had already shut his eyes and pulled his bandana over them. This didn't keep it from getting in his mouth, however, and Meta Knight laughed at him despite all the salt in his eyes. Bandana Dee glared at the blue puff (not that he could see said glare very well) before spitting out the last mouthful of saltwater and walking over to the fish. Dedede was looking at the puffball's now-turned-fish sword as well. Drool was running from the corner of the king's mouth. Bandana Dee's eye twitched. _Royalty should have some manners..._

"Is it alive?" He asked cautiously over the background noises of Meta Knight's snickering, which was sounding forced at this point.

"No, the fish is dead—which is kind of disgusting, now that I think about it." Kirby flinched. Meta Knight walked over nonchalantly and cautiously examined the fish with the others like nothing had happened. The quartet finally looked up at each other.

"Well, it looks fresh enough to me," Meta Knight stated. "I'll eat it. After all, it's not like I'll die from food poisoning."

"Really?" Bandana Dee raised an eyebrow.

"No. I'll just feel like my insides are being spun around in a whirlpool. Hopefully this thing ate some good seasoning herbs, or medicinal ones."

"We can cook it, guys; that'll get rid of the badness. There's tons of hotspots all around here; let's just fry it over one," Kirby said, already dreaming of a fishy meal. The imaginary Ultra Tuna dropped down sizzling on a simple blue dish with a glass of fruit juice and a bowl of cheap macaroni and cheese, which probably wasn't the best combination to each with the fish.

"What are we going to skewer it on?" Bandana Dee questioned.

The others turned to him. The Waddle Dee blinked before realizing what they meant. "Oh come on guys, you can't think of any better ideas?"

"Not really. But this is the easiest," Dedede stated casually.

* * *

Fifteen minutes later, the Ultra Tuna (or at least, one of them) was hanging over a spot of lava from Bandana Dee's two spears. The Waddle Dee was very unhappy about having his equipment smell like fish for the rest of the adventure but since Meta Knight was using his sword to cut the fish up, he couldn't complain much. The four of them were sitting around it like a campfire waiting for it to cook, but without the s'mores. Kirby yawned. Then Dedede. Then Meta Knight.

And Bandana Dee sat there for a while before he finally yawned too.

"So guys, about how close do you think we are to Landia's mountain about now?" Bandana Dee asked, trying to make conversation.

Kirby and Meta Knight whispered a bit before Kirby nodded to Meta Knight. "According to our calculations, we're probably on the side of it," Kirby threw out.

Bandana Dee's and Dedede's eyes grew big and they peered out into the distance. Then they looked up.

"Well, shoot."

To their dismay, the trip up was about three times more than the trip down. And that was saying something, because the normally height-loving Bandana Dee was now hoping that they weren't climbing any close cliffs even though the mountain was obviously enchanted with caves and meteors as the only way up. Kirby and Meta Knight were now busy talking about the spells placed on the meteors, along with which one of them would be a better pilot to fly through the meteor tunnel above them to the top of the mountain. Kirby would probably end up winning; not only were his Warpstar skills more recently-used, he was physically stronger than Meta Knight and could push him into some lava if he disagreed with him. Being completely honest, Dedede and Bandana Dee were pretty sure that they'd rather have Kirby driving anyway—Meta Knight was notorious for pulling tricks and they weren't interested in finding out whether he'd be any safer with multiple passengers to take care of.

The lava hissed and flared up, and the fish sizzled. Bandana Dee started to freak out when he remembered that his spears were supporting it. He was not particularly interested in losing his best spears, especially to fry a fish. Dedede went around to one side to grab it, and Kirby and Meta Knight took the other. Despite the insanely high temperature of the fish, the trio took their time with it—after all, they'd gone through a lot of trouble to get this fish. When they finally sat it down a little bit away from the lava, they instantly released it and started blowing on their hands. Bandana Dee snickered at the sight before pulling his spears out of the mess. Kirby and Meta Knight started slicing it up, but the puffballs got a little annoyed when Dedede tried to take the fresh-cut meat before they'd finished cutting the whole thing up. Bandana Dee quickly tackled the king and told Kirby to use the large slabs of scales as serving dishes—if the puffballs felt their food was threatened, they might inhale it all, and that would leave the king and his Dee with no dinner. A few minutes later, the fish was ready to eat. There was a small area of warm moss that the quartet carried the fish over to, deciding that they should eat there. Dedede reached for the first and biggest piece, but stopped when he noticed everybody staring at him. "Uh, what?"

None of them said anything. Dedede sat there for a moment before realization hit. "Oh, yeah, you guys are waiting for me to try it in case it tastes nasty. Thanks a lot."

"He who laughs first laughs last," Meta Knight quipped.

"Uh, couldn't you have used a quote about greed or something?" Kirby asked.

"Well, no. I can't remember those quotes very well. I haven't used them in about…a month, maybe; actually, five months…"

Dedede flinched before taking a bite of the fish. He chewed it for a few seconds before his eyes lit up in hearts. "Wow! This's great! And it doesn't even have any seasoning on it!"

At this message, all the others dove into the pile of meat, which was quickly depleting. At this point, everyone seemed to be eating just because it was good. Not much conversation went on because they were all busy stuffing their faces, but eventually Dedede's and Bandana Dee's eating started to slope down to nibbling. Kirby and Meta Knight were still at it, though, but what did you expect? They're black holes.

"Ahhhh, we deserve a snack after that battle with the two Sphere Doomers. Thanks for sacrificing your ability for us though, Kirby," Dedede muttered through a mouthful of fish. The pile was almost completely gone—correction, it _was_ gone; Kirby scooped it into his mouth. The pink puff moved his body around a bit before spitting out a star-marked scale.

"Wait," Bandana Dee interrupted. "Kirby, dimensional tears destroy your Copy Ability. How did you still get the Ultra Sword ability?"

"Simple. I left it behind as I jumped through the portal. When we were tossed back out, I picked it up again."

"Uh…why?" Bandana Dee asked. "Or do I want to know?"

"So that when I rode the Warpstar through the series of asteroids-slash-meteors, I'd look super cool and the awesome music would be playing since the Warpstar freezes the Super Ability countdown. Use logic," Kirby replied in a matter-of-fact tone of voice.

"Kirby! No! You're breaking the fourth wall—wait..." Meta Knight stopped his 'protect the fourth wall' lecture. "Yes! Somebody who actually gets that psychology! Awesome, Kirby."

Meta Knight gave Kirby a high…well, a high however-many-fingers-they-have before he shoved the rest of his serving into his mouth. Kirby made a 'tch' sound before jumping up. "Well, we're gonna get a Warpstar ride in a few seconds! I hope none of your stomachs react badly to fish or loops and spirals, because that's what we're going to be doing as soon as you finish. _Please try not to throw up on me…"_ He added timidly as he saw Dedede and Bandana Dee glaring at him. Of course, he didn't have to worry about Meta Knight because they were the same species and could only _feel_ sick instead of…_getting_ sick, shall we say. Dedede growled.

"Kirby, you really need to get a sense of timing on your advice."

"Hey! I'm not the only one! Meta Knight's advice was more ill-timed than mine!"

"Well I just have delayed reactions sometimes! Not all of us can be perfect, even though people think I am…"

Dedede snorted. "What people in Dream Land are they?"

"Not them, the fangirls." The puffball stated casually. "But anyway, you—"

"My spears smell like fish, guys! You said they wouldn't!"

"I'm sorry, I—"

"META KNIGHT, YOU JUST BROKE THE FOURTH WALL, YOU HYPOCRITE!"

"You broke it again by saying that!"

"Well YOU broke it AGAIN by replying!"

"Well YOU keep breaking it and YOU'RE the one who broke it in the first place!"

"Does this fishy dish come with dessert?"

This line earned Dedede three unreadable stares. "What?"

* * *

…Did they technically even FRY it?


End file.
